Aren't Smart Doctors Closer to Home, Too?

Published: December 30, 2001

To the Editor:

Thank-you for the article on Westchester hospitals.[''Care Closer to Home,'' Dec. 16.] It reinforces what we've been telling our patients for years.

But I was bewildered to read the statement of the woman who would ''rather be at a city teaching hospital with the latest technology and the smartest people.'' Most of the current Westchester physicians trained at those very same teaching hospitals and chose to practice in Westchester for various professional and personal reasons. Did we leave our brains behind when we left New York City? It reminds me of a facetious saying that has circulated among my colleagues for years: ''If a patient in a local hospital has a complication, it's because the local doctor screwed up. If the patient goes into the city and has a complication, it's God's will.''